I'm guessing ESPN was the highest bidder for Mex games because they knew they would get the most bang for their buck. For US games, I'm sure ESPN just decided that they weren't going to make that much off of it and so they didn't bother paying over what they felt was market value.

quote:Let me see if I understand this correctly.... the next 5 Mex.{home or away} WC qualifiers, will ALL be broadcast via ESPN or ESPN2, while ALL US away qualifiers are on some third rate,hope you can find it,screwed up internet site ?????

I agree with you, bro.

I scoured the earth to find an acceptable solution to this dilemma......

....and then I got DirecTV. Very few people have heard of it. It's a "satellite" that shoots "laser beams" at my "house." And these "laser beams" contain more "soccer" than I can watch.

Not sure if the OP knows how TV rights in soccer work, I know I didn't just a few months ago. Until one of America's away games was going to be on PPV.

ESPN bought the rights to show the Mexico WCQ games in America. From what I gathered the last few months is that each game you are paying the host country. I ASSuME they didn't pay a ton for the rights to show Mexico games in America. But just know that ESPN did not have to outbid TV stations in Mexico or any other country.

The OP's original point that he would've like ESPN to shell out the cash for the home AND away games still stands. I'm sure we can all agree on that. It did not make sense financially and from a business perspective, however, so that didn't happen.

Also, if I remember correctly, according to TN Bhoy, thenry knows "ABSOLUTELY NOTHING" about soccer or something like that. So take that for what it's worth.

quote:From what I gathered the last few months is that each game you are paying the host country.

Yes and no. The host country can do whatever TF they want to with the broadcast rights. The "business sense" thing to do is to sell them to the highest bidder.

Traffic Sports bought the rights directly from the individual federations, and (I'm guessing) took the valuable pieces (i.e Mexico and US home and away matches) and sell those to the highest bidders. Univision valued the Spanish language Mexican rights for all matches the most. (I honestly don't know if Uni deals with FMF or Traffic on that.) I assume a similar deal is in place with the US and ESPN.

Traffic held the rights to the first US away qualifiers in the last round and distributed them on PPV, presumably to build outrage/demand and drive the price up. BeIN comes in with a large bid for the English and Spanish rights to the US away package to push their new channels.

The leftover piece? English language rights to Mexican home matches. Who would want those, right? Amerimexicans probably want the broadcast in Spanish. So.... Who would want those? People who want to see the Mexico home match against the USA. My guess is ESPN bought those on the cheap, which may be good for idiot US "fans" like the OP.

TL;DR version:

Each fed sells the rights to who they deem fit. ESPN and Univision bought the broadcast rights to the home matches in native language for their respective federations. Traffic approaches the smaller feds, buys their home rights, chops the valuable parts up.... Sells them to the highest bidder, PPVs the rest. BeIN outbids ESPN for the most valuable piece... US away rights.

re: Mexico WC Qualifiers on ESPNPosted by ohiovol on 2/1/13 at 11:48 am to Sheep

quote:

Yes and no. The host country can do whatever TF they want to with the broadcast rights. The "business sense" thing to do is to sell them to the highest bidder.

Traffic Sports bought the rights directly from the individual federations, and (I'm guessing) took the valuable pieces (i.e Mexico and US home and away matches) and sell those to the highest bidders. Univision valued the Spanish language Mexican rights for all matches the most. (I honestly don't know if Uni deals with FMF or Traffic on that.) I assume a similar deal is in place with the US and ESPN.

Traffic held the rights to the first US away qualifiers in the last round and distributed them on PPV, presumably to build outrage/demand and drive the price up. BeIN comes in with a large bid for the English and Spanish rights to the US away package to push their new channels.

The leftover piece? English language rights to Mexican home matches. Who would want those, right? Amerimexicans probably want the broadcast in Spanish. So.... Who would want those? People who want to see the Mexico home match against the USA. My guess is ESPN bought those on the cheap, which may be good for idiot US "fans" like the OP.

TL;DR version:

Each fed sells the rights to who they deem fit. ESPN and Univision bought the broadcast rights to the home matches in native language for their respective federations. Traffic approaches the smaller feds, buys their home rights, chops the valuable parts up.... Sells them to the highest bidder, PPVs the rest. BeIN outbids ESPN for the most valuable piece... US away rights.

TL;DR summary:

frick CONCACAF, frick Mexico, frick Traffic Sports.

I'm not saying you're wrong, because I have no idea, but this is definitely what I've been telling myself to make myself feel better. I just can't believe that the Mexican national team is more popular than the USA national team within our boarders.